4 Ways Manufacturing ERP Software Improves Product Quality

10th December 2014

There are many ways to make most products. We particularly see this in process manufacturing where a good product yield can arise from changes in temperature or pressure. But good quality manufacturing suggests we maintain quality by reducing the variables in our processes. Here is where ERP product quality management helps.

1. Defining & Measuring Environmental Variables

In our manufacturing ERP system, we can define our preferred temperature and the pressure to match as a part of our routing. Now we can measure the temperature and pressure actually used in the process to ensure it matches our defined values. If we encounter any quality problems, we know these variables are not the cause. We expect good quality from this proven ratio but we can expect to consistently produce higher quality products as we refine this process further by tracking changes in our ERP.

2. Developing a Product Quality Plan

Manufacturing ERP systems also allow us to develop a quality plan to check production at any step from material receipt to finished product. A medical device manufacturer can list several requirements for an incoming component. It must have a certificate of conformance, the dimensions of attachment holes must be precise and the resistance across poles must be within a certain range. These requirements are captured within the ERP product quality module and a place to show the values as received is defined. The certificate of conformance gets a yes / no entry. The hole dimension will be in millimeters and the resistance in ohms. The name and ID of the person making the quality entry is captured along with the transaction. We can verify that person has required training and permissions to make the inspection. These steps are not new but the ability to formally capture the data and keep it available for review is important to product quality.

3. Accurate Data Capture

Throughout our ERP we capture transactions of all kinds. We can easily add data that we need as our ERP allows up to define user fields for integers, dates, times, decimal, and logical values. Whether the data is pre-defined by the developer or our own self-defined, ERP will accurately capture it. Accurate data in your ERP product quality module is necessary for quality analysis and allows us to know that we are consistently producing high quality products whether we are a discrete or process manufacturer.

4. Document Management & Reporting

Document control is also important to product quality. We need to have accurate and up to date drawings to be sure we are making products to our customer’s specifications. Our bills of materials and recipes must be up to date to ensure the resulting plans for procurement and inventory management in our ERP will be correct. These documents are the basis for our ERP data. If they are correct, we can measure what we actually produced against the production required as well as ensuring high product quality.

Tom Miller

About the author…

Tom completed implementations of Epicor, SAP, QAD, and Micro MRP. He works as a logistics and supply chain manager and he always looks for processes to improve. He lives near San Francisco Bay in California and can be found on the water in his kayak or on the road riding his motorcycle. Contact Tom at customerteam@erpfocus.com.